I attended my first post-cancer treatment art class. It is a Journaling class – full of tricks and tips to make backgrounds and interesting pages. I signed up because my art was getting stale – and I wanted to get back into the world of people with like interests.

It was fun learning how to use stencils – we had our pick of the instructor’s toys – inks, paper, stencils and stamps. I finally learned not to ruin the stencils with too wet an ink. Well, generally, I tried to use paint, but that was a disaster. I’ll post some photos when I van download them off the camera.

I also finished Addisyn’s letters for her room. I’ll post photos of them too.

I slept a lot yesterday – I got a chill in the afternoon and started coughing and sneezing. Went right to bed and woke up feeling better.

In the emergency room – went in for severe pain in my abdomen (near the hernia site). I was very vocal about the pain – tried to hide it, but it kept on hurting. So, I arrive around just after Noon – when did I leave? 9 p.m. One of the CT Scans was down and they needed that to see what was going on. They gave me some morphine and some fluids, told me to rest until the scan machine was ready (around 6 p.m.). The morphine had worn off by then, but the pain went away.

Was told to see my primary doctor, which I did today. He said just monitor it and if the pain happens again, lay down and rest. Gravity will push the hernia back in the abdominal wall. Great. More info than you wanted to know, right?

I was up at the Activities Desk at the clubhouse trying to book two seats on a bus going to San Francisco to go to the Chinese New Year celebration at the end of Feb., when this parade of people went by laughing and having a good time. A woman leaned over to me and asked me if I wanted to be in a commercial for Skittles.

I said no and then found out the trip was full – no seats were available. So then I went to find the Skittles party. They had a football player from the Oakland Raiders hawking the new brand of Skittles that has tabasco-like hot stuff in it. People was absolutely giddy over this guy – he was a big man with dreadlocks and no, I didn’t get his name. I was seated on the group W bench – two groups were ahead of me. While waiting, I had some good conversations with other people waiting – no one knew his name either.

Well, I watched the filming and then things got complicated as more people found out there was a commercial being filmed – people started getting ahead of other people in line, and the noise was getting too loud for filming. They asked us all to step inside the building and then the drive-ups started – golf carts and cars filled with old people wanting to be a star.

I didn’t need it that badly, so I left after an hour and a half of waiting. sigh. Not patient enough to wrap my arms around being a celebrity in a Skittles commercial. Oh well, what would I do with the paycheck being in the form of Skittles anyway.

Truthfully, it was downright embarrassing to see those people fawn over a football player who shall remain unnamed. Sometimes I don’t like people.

So, what the heck is this? I forget the name, but it’s good grated over veggies and salads – looks strange?

Lots of people had them at the Folsom Farmers Market. We had to try one of course. We had a good time listening to music and petting everyone else’s dogs – one of the benefits of non-ownership, pet them, love them, wish them well when they go on their way. I’ve had friends like that – never heard much from them when I was diagnosed. Who wants to hear that anyway? I get tired of listening to myself too. I told the therapist how I was feeling and she said I was grieving over my past life. Darn right. Nothing wrong with that. It’s all been a loss – loss of power, loss of identity, loss of confidence – why did my body betray me like this? Well. to be honest – no one or no thing did this to me. My doctor said it was a dumb luck, so I choose to believe his story.

Yesterday, we were driving through Lincoln, trying to find the skeleton horse. I saw on a ride last week, but I didn’t have my camera. So we went back trying to find it. Oh, and on the way, we wanted to see Hidden Falls, a state park with trails for riding, bicycle and hiking. We pull it and are met by a Park Ranger – he asked if we had a reservation. Huh? I guess starting in January, you need a reservation for the weekends if you want to visit. This tiny park in the middle of nowhere – but HINT: surrounded by large wineries and farms – guess people didn’t like the crowds parking on their roads (no shoulders on back roads), so I imagine they lobbied and got “their” park on the reservation track. I was astounded – reservations? Also, you’ll need to pay $8 a car. I guess the poor with never see this park. Grrrr.

Anyhow, found the horse. If they are so rich, they should feed this horse. (across the road from the entrance to the park).

I am signing up for an Art Journal class. I know a lot of the basics, but I need a jump-start to “play” again. During this illness, I’ve had ideas for paintings and other things, but I quickly lose steam moving forward. I had this when Joe died – and I took a Bob Ross painting class to jump start my creativity back then. It worked. Just being out with people helped – people who share those artsy frustrations.

But planning also is a big step. While on chemo, it was just going to chemo, relaxing through the side effects and bearing through them. No plans, no schedules – it wouldn’t matter – I could not tell if I was going to feel well enough to do anything.

Well, I am further complicating things by actually paying for the class – now I know I will go if I have to forfeit $45 for two days of class. HA – cheap old me. I’ll let you know how it turns out.

I finished Shiprock yesterday – will post some photos later this afternoon.